Springtime. Time for Cascarones, gente!

[msedano]

1. Gather your eggs. When you open a blanquillo, use the edge of a knife and crack the narrow end with sharp blows. Remove the end and pour out the whole egg, poach or cook que se salen. (That my granma's word for "over medium". So this cook at a buffet in el Defie asks me how I want my egs, I say "que se salen" and he gives me a blank stare. "Over medium" I say and he does so.) If you wish, poke a hole in one end first, then poke a hole in the other end. Blow out the contents and cook scrambled. Rinse the shell and let dry.

2. Use wax crayon to draw designs and stuff on the dried egg shell. Dye the shells and allow to dry thoroughly. All year, save the punchholes from your paper puncher. I also buy colored paper confetti at party stores. Do not use the plastic or aluminum confetti, unless you want to put out eyes.

3. When your spring fling arrives, crack cascarones on cocos. Careful in intercultural settings. When my kidlet was tiny she cracked one on her friend's head. The friend, being anglo, didn't understand the ritual and slugged my daughter.

4. Sweep up the mess.

[Lost-in-FL]

1. Lemme ask...

What dyed "cascarones", dyed chicks and rabbits have to do with easter?

[msedano]

2. damned if i know.

what does "easter" have to do with spring? i've never owned a dyed animal. why do you ask? i can come up all sorts of fanciful explanations, and i'm guessing you have a theory of your own. ni modo. remember, it's the "u" in "fun" that counts.

as far back as i can remember, st. mary's church held a springtime jamaica to raise funds for the school and other needs. the cascarones were a nickle each, then later, a dime each. we'd go around collecting bottles for weeks so as to have money to buy cascarones. the small coke and RC botellas brought in two cents, the quart bottles a nickle.

[Lost-in-FL]

3. I seriously don't know why...

I remember the first time I had a dyed chick. It was blue. Several weeks later it got too big to be fun to look at, and it discolored.

Then a few months later, at the dinner table I asked my mom if she had seen my chicken. She said its in your "sopa".

[msedano]

4. the practice is curtailed or gone by now...

i hope. my family raised chickens and rabbits. for food. i dimly remember seeing dyed animals. i can't see us ever paying for one, unless it was an excuse to grow the flock.

the famous chicano poet, w.b. yeats, teaches people the awesome responsibility of owning pets. when my daughter wanted to start owning animales, i shared this verse with her. it's something to be mindful of no matter the animal you've a mind to acquire.

38. Two Songs of a Fool


I

A SPECKLED cat and a tame hare
Eat at my hearthstone
And sleep there;
And both look up to me alone
For learning and defence 5
As I look up to Providence.

I start out of my sleep to think
Some day I may forget
Their food and drink;
Or, the house door left unshut, 10
The hare may run till it’s found
The horn’s sweet note and the tooth of the hound.

I bear a burden that might well try
Men that do all by rule,
And what can I 15
That am a wandering witted fool
But pray to God that He ease
My great responsibilities?

II

I slept on my three-legged stool by the fire,
The speckled cat slept on my knee; 20
We never thought to enquire
Where the brown hare might be,
And whether the door were shut.
Who knows how she drank the wind
Stretched up on two legs from the mat, 25
Before she had settled her mind
To drum with her heel and to leap:
Had I but awakened from sleep
And called her name she had heard,
It may be, and had not stirred, 30
That now, it may be, has found
The horn’s sweet note and the tooth of the hound.

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